]]>A prominent Chinese Christian leader discussed religious freedom in the nation at the Family Research Council Wednesday.

Bob Fu is the founder and president of China Aid Association, an international non-profit Christian human rights organization committed to promoting religious freedom and the rule of law in China. He is also editor-in-chief of the Chinese Law and Religion Monitor, a biennial journal on the same subjects.

He told the story of Chen Guangfu, whose house was attacked Sunday, April 21.

"The government orchestrated a group of thugs throwing stones and sticks, and even dead chickens and dead dogs and beer bottles," Fu said.

Guangfu is the brother of the blind activist and lawyer Chen Guangchen, who will address the American Bar Association’s Section for International Law Thursday afternoon.

Guangchen "had already verbally received a life threat from the party secretary of the village, because of the blind lawyer’s overseas advocacy for the rule of law and freedom."

"There are many other instances of Christian persecution in China," Fu told the Washington Free Beacon. "Over this past weekend, seven of the church leaders were sentenced to three to seven half-years imprisonment." The Chinese government condemned these four women and three men in Hunan province "for simply being house church leaders."

"We’re still on the planning end to schedule meetings with members of Congress and to brief the State Department," Fu said.

Fu discussed the difference between the house church movement and state-sponsored churches in China. The house church movement "is the majority of China’s underground church." He said the state-sponsored church is watered down and inauthentic and the government only allows one version of the Bible, which cannot be sold "in public places."

"There is a definite shortage of supply of Bibles in China," he said.

Fu grew up as an atheist. "I came to my Christian faith when I was in university, leading the student movement. … Organized that protest to Tiananmen Square, and we finally witnessed the atrocity by the Chinese government," he said.

After the protest, "the Chinese government took revenge against me, I was disillusioned, I despaired and contemplated suicide," Fu said.

For his own faith and advocacy, the Chinese government persecuted Fu, and he fled to America.

"President Bill Clinton and Secretary Madeleine Albright took us directly as refugees," he said, noting their "tremendous support" for him.

Fu praised President George W. Bush as well, but had sharp words for President Barack Obama.

"The current administration does not have a track record on the religious freedom issue, especially in diplomacy," he said.

Believers in Beijing’s Shouwang church in the past three years "have been taken into police custody more than 1,000 times, and there have been more than 800 short-term detentions."

The violence has not deterred believers. "Despite—or some would say because of—this persecution … Christianity has grown, over 100-fold," Fu said.

While there were fewer than 1 million believers in 1949, today a conservative estimate hits 60-80 million, and some have said as many as 130 million. Fu puts it slightly over 100 million.

]]>http://freebeacon.com/national-security/religious-freedom-in-china/feed/0Giving Guerrillas the Boothttp://freebeacon.com/national-security/giving-guerrillas-the-boot/
http://freebeacon.com/national-security/giving-guerrillas-the-boot/#respondSat, 26 Jan 2013 09:59:58 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=54407Max Boot’s new book, “Invisible Armies: An Epic History of Guerrilla Warfare from Ancient Times to the Present,” questions the widely held view that unconventional warfare is a new problem.

]]>"There’s a tendency to designate guerrilla warfare as irregular or unconventional, but it’s always been the dominant way of war," said Max Boot, senior fellow in national security studies at New York’s Council on Foreign Relations.

"The use of hit-and-run tactics, ambush, and surprise to negate the firepower advantage of a conventional military is an ancient form of warfare," Boot said.

"Even where conventional warfare was defined, it was just one way of many," Boot said.

Boot praised the United States Army as "the finest counter-insurgency force the world has ever seen," but urged against the "push to return to conventional warfare, which may never reemerge. That would run counter to the lessons of history."

"You need some degree of legitimacy, some form of popular acquiescence," Boot said of insurgencies. "If all you’re offering is death, the people will depose you."

Radical Islamists "can only have success where there’s a complete vacuum," Boot said. Libya, Mali, and Afghanistan each present opportunities for radicals because these countries have never experienced a strong, legitimate government.

Thomas Donnelly, co-director of the Marilyn Ware Center for Security Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, echoed Boot’s remarks on Middle Eastern instability. "The region is a long way from becoming a stable, self-governing place, whether we’re there or not," he said.

"There’s a need to preserve a balance between conventional military power and irregular wars," he said. "The American Revolution was an American insurgency, but it depended on support from France and the fact that Britain was fighting on many other fronts," he said.

Steve Bucci, a 28-year Army veteran and director of the Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies at the Heritage Foundation, emphasized the importance of Boot’s analysis.

Many officers tried "to flush the lessons from Vietnam out of the army" during his early training. The military officials wanted to leave it in the past since the United States and France suffered in that conflict.

Bucci joined Army Special Forces where "guerrilla warfare stuff was our meat and potatoes."

"Officers who were trained conventionally had to figure out a different kind of intelligence gathering and organization." Bucci said. "They weren’t very good at it at first, but they got better from Iraq and are applying the lessons to Afghanistan."

"Putting those tactics on the shelf is ahistorical and unrealistic," Bucci said. "That’s dangerous."

]]>http://freebeacon.com/national-security/giving-guerrillas-the-boot/feed/0Shining a Light on Slaveryhttp://freebeacon.com/uncategorized/shining-a-light-on-slavery/
http://freebeacon.com/uncategorized/shining-a-light-on-slavery/#respondFri, 11 Jan 2013 15:42:03 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=49901Friday marks national Human Trafficking Awareness Day and President Obama has designated January the “National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month.”

]]>Friday marks national Human Trafficking Awareness Day and President Obama has designated January the "National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month."

"There’s an estimated 1 million human trafficking victims—from a 12-year-old girl in the sex trade to a 60-year-old man working for no pay—on U.S. soil," said Mark Blackwell, president of Justice Ministries, a nonprofit organization focused on rescuing and healing sex trafficking victims.

Blackwell dedicated his life to this cause at the Christian Passion Conference in 2010.

"When I learned that there was a 12-year-old girl being raped and sold for sex in my city—nothing else seemed that important," he said. "I felt like the Lord was calling me to go to victims."

Justice Ministries provides housing for victims in the Carolinas. Blackwell said it serves about a hundred people per year.

Linda Smith, a former Republican congresswoman from Washington state and founding president of Shared Hope International, a 501(c)(3) dedicated to fighting sex trafficking and slavery, said that a conservative estimate of the number of underage children in the sex trade is around 100,000.

"I can go into any city, go online, and go shopping. … The average age of entry was about 13 when they were first trafficked," Smith said.

According to its website, Shared Hope aims to prevent human trafficking, restore the victims, and bring justice through the legal system.

Chosen, a documentary to be released in March by Shared Hope, will tell the story of two normal American teens who were tricked into trafficking over a period of months.

The template described in the documentary is simple. An older man approaches a teenage girl, flirts with her, makes her feel mature, and builds a relationship. The girl’s friends congratulate her on her older boyfriend. He asks her to do something dirty one day—to help him out. Then he scares her, saying the police will arrest her for prostitution and threatening to abuse her younger sister if she refuses.

She finds herself with nowhere to turn.

"Most girls like them would never have been trafficked—if they can identify the signs," Smith said.

]]>Karen Handel, one-time senior vice president for public policy at the Susan G. Komen for the Cure, said Planned Parenthood’s January funding battle with Komen was a "test campaign" for President Barack Obama’s reelection. The media blitz and public outcry followed by Komen’s capitulation, she said, convinced Democratic strategists that social issues could lead Democrats to victory in 2012.

Komen found itself mired in controversy when it announced it would no longer provide funding for Planned Parenthood. Liberals and Democratic politicians charged that the organization was putting politics ahead of the health of women. Pro-life advocates pointed out Planned Parenthood did not actually perform mammograms.

Komen reversed course, reinstated the funding, and fired Handel, who recounted the events in her recent memoir Planned Bullyhood.

The Komen fight convinced Democratic operatives that Obama could keep his hold on the Oval Office by dividing the electorate on abortion despite a weak economic recovery, a foreign policy scandal, the bankruptcy of expensive solar energy projects, and numerous broken promises.

"The capitulation was made because of politics," Handel said of Komen, which had never wanted to involve itself in the abortion debate. She said new donations from pro-life supporters of the fight against breast cancer promised to outweigh the potential loss of corporate sponsors.

"Our biggest mistake was thinking Planned Parenthood valued the best interests of the fight against breast cancer," she said.

"Planned Parenthood claims to be about women’s health, yet they had no hesitation in sacrificing Komen, an organization that does stand for women’s health," Handel said.

Handel called herself "naive" for believing that she had worked out an amicable separation from Planned Parenthood. She noted the friendship between Komen’s former president Liz Thompson, and Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood.

After Komen’s management made the decision, they planned to silence concerns with a simple press release.

Management also planned to avoid interviews. "Send it out, say no more," she said.

Then Komen’s vice president of communications, Leslie Aun, spoke to the press.

"She blatantly defied management," Handel said.

Aun has denied the charge, but Handel presented more evidence that Planned Parenthood orchestrated a communications blitz.

"Prior to the first story came blog posts, tweets, clearly an orchestrated campaign," she said. "Dear colleague" letters from congressional offices appeared the day after the announcement. "Congress doesn’t work that fast," she said.

Moveon.org and Change.org issued petitions, asking Komen to restore the grants and to fire Handel. Her Facebook and Twitter accounts were hacked. Protests formed outside Komen’s corporate sponsors.

Planned Parenthood reached out to its allies in the LGBT community, cashing in chits earned during its lobbying campaign "to defeat traditional marriage and voter ID laws."

]]>http://freebeacon.com/politics/the-dress-rehearsal-for-obama-2012/feed/0Equal Treatment Under the Lawhttp://freebeacon.com/politics/equal-treatment-under-the-law/
http://freebeacon.com/politics/equal-treatment-under-the-law/#respondThu, 06 Dec 2012 10:00:25 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=41739Ward Connerly says the Supreme Court’s upcoming ruling in Fisher v. University of Texas may help kill racial preferences once and for all.

]]>Ward Connerly says the Supreme Court’s upcoming ruling in Fisher v. University of Texas may help kill racial preferences once and for all.

The court’s impending decision in Fisher, in which a white woman sued the University of Texas for using race as a factor in admissions, follows several state referenda rejecting racial preferences in higher education and the workforce.

Oklahoma voters banned such practices on Nov. 6 by a vote of 59 percent to 41 percent. Bans also have been passed over the years with similar majorities in states, including 60-40 in Arizona, 59-41 in Washington, 58-42 in Michigan and Nebraska, and 55-45 in California.

Connerly, founder and president of the American Civil Rights Institute, spearheaded the movement to ban affirmative action. He explained his opposition to racial preferences in an interview with the Free Beacon and suggested President Barack Obama’s reelection means it is time to scrap such programs once and for all.

Connerly saw an "enormous difference" between the standards for black, Latino, and Native Americans and those for Asians and whites while serving as a regent for the University of California for 12 years. A ‘C’ student would have better chances than a ‘B’ student, depending on his race.

Connerly said that preference has outlived its purpose. "The whole premise of affirmative action," he said, "is that we live in a largely racist society. … That notion is profoundly rejected when the American people elected a brown-skinned guy."

"He has polarized us into the haves and the have-nots," Connerly explained, and "he has demeaned a lot of people in the process."

He also defended Sens. John McCain (R, Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R, S.C.), and Kelly Ayotte (R, N.H.) from accusations of racism for criticizing United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice. "The argument that Ambassador Rice is getting a raw deal because of her mixed ancestry is ridiculous," he said.

"She made statements that, at the time, were problematic and later proven false," he said. The fact that those statements were made weeks before a critical election made it "perfectly justifiable to ask if she made them in order to support the president."

"Anyone following the careers of John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Kelly Ayotte knows that these people are not racist," he added. "There’s nothing to support that."

Additionally, he said, affirmative action has hurt the black population of the United States. "I think it’s prolonged this legacy that black people are inferior—that we are incapable of carrying our own weight," Connerly said.

"Race preferences, while they might have been justified at some point in time, have outlived their usefulness and they’re beginning to reverse their effect," he said. "We’ve got to get rid of race preferences."

Connerly expects the Supreme Court to rule against racial preferences.

"I don’t believe they would have heard the Fisher case if they were not prepared to act in it," he said. He expects them "to strike the allowable use of race if not to eliminate it altogether."

]]>http://freebeacon.com/politics/equal-treatment-under-the-law/feed/0Private (Union) Takeover of Public Schoolshttp://freebeacon.com/politics/private-union-takeover-of-public-schools/
http://freebeacon.com/politics/private-union-takeover-of-public-schools/#respondMon, 19 Nov 2012 10:00:05 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=38265President Barack Obama and the Democrats have portrayed themselves as supporters of public education but their policies have turned public schools into strongholds for powerful private groups of teachers unions, critics say.

]]>President Barack Obama and the Democrats have portrayed themselves as supporters of public education, but their policies have turned public schools into strongholds for powerful private groups of teachers unions, critics say.

"The union is not some branch of public government—they’re just a private corporation," said James Sayler, a 20-year public school teacher and founder of Colorado Educators for Bush in 2000 and 2004.

"Should a school district give away public authority to a private organization?" Sayler asked. "The unions, with the blessing and cooperation of the Democratic Party, have privatized education."

"The system is designed for you as a teachers union to elect the people you are going to bargain with, at a local level," Wolfram said. "You have an incentive to elect state representatives who provide high spending so you can keep salaries high."

"They are a lobbying firm," he said. "The Michigan Education Association is one of the larger political action committees."

"It’s not like a market where you buy things and pay for them out of your own money," he said. "The government taxes you, and then puts money into that school. … Whether that school does a good job or a bad job—whether the students prefer that school or not—it gets paid on a per capita basis."

Government union members have outnumbered those in the private industry since 2009. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report for 2011, "Public-sector workers had a union membership rate (37.0 percent) more than five times higher than that of private-sector workers (6.9 percent)."

"Private sector unions have been driven out by competition," Wolfram said. But public sector unions have political power, making it "difficult to support reform."

"Government unions are the chief force fighting for larger taxes and bigger government," said Vincent Vernuccio, director of Labor Policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.

"The very nature and purposes of government make it impossible for administrative officials to represent fully or to bind the employer in mutual discussions with government employee organizations," Roosevelt wrote. "The employer is the whole people, who speak by means of laws enacted by their representatives in Congress."

Any negotiation with a public employee union would constitute a loss of the people’s authority, the founder of the New Deal said.

Roosevelt considered public union strikes "unthinkable and intolerable," because they cause "the paralysis of Government by those who have sworn to support it."

Sayler suggested Republicans adopt a new tactic when it comes to teachers unions.

"We in the Republican Party believe in government of the people, by the people, and for the people," Sayler said. "The Republican Party got so involved in charter and voucher schools, they just forgot to fight for the public schools."

"We’re going to give them back to the people," he said.

According to Sayler, the principal’s "number one job" should be "to set up an independent Parent Teachers’ Organization (PTO)." As opposed to the National Parent Teacher Association (PTA), which answers to the National Education Association union, Sayler supports "a separate organization under total control of the principal."

Former Secretary of Education Rod Paige said Sayler’s ideas are intriguing.

"It's a new idea and it's a powerful idea," Paige said. It will "give us an entirely different perspective on the relationship unions have with these school districts."

Principals must also gain authority directly from the school board without the interference of the unions, said Sayler.

"[With unions] everybody’s afraid because there’s no legitimate authority set up," he said.

]]>http://freebeacon.com/politics/private-union-takeover-of-public-schools/feed/0Down and Out in Obama’s Americahttp://freebeacon.com/politics/down-and-out-in-obamas-america/
http://freebeacon.com/politics/down-and-out-in-obamas-america/#respondMon, 05 Nov 2012 10:00:03 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=36551The jobs report for the month of October released on Friday reveals a bleak outlook and lack of opportunity for younger workers in the Obama economy.

"The fact that unemployment numbers for young Americans have increased since the month of September" tells young people that "the economy under President Obama is not improving at a rate that will make a difference in restoring their stalled careers and damaged dreams," Paul T. Conway, president of Generation Opportunity, told the WashingtonFree Beacon.

"Across the country and in states like Ohio, where 63 percent of young adult independents say that policies coming from Washington are hurting them, Millennials will see today’s news as all the more reason to vote for change on Tuesday."

"The president and his policies are responsible for the largest drop in support among young voters for any sitting president in recent history," Conway concluded.

Conway rejected the idea that Millennials are simply too lazy to find work.

"The fault rests not with the individual but rather with the president and his team, because absent his failed economic policies, this generation would already have contributed with their skills and education to the restoration of the American economy," Conway said.

Rep. Allen West (R., Fla.) agreed that the economy had not sufficiently improved.

"We need a private sector jobs market that is creating 250,000 to 300,000 jobs per month to get us moving back to a national full-time unemployment rate of five percent," West told the Free Beacon.

"Let us not forget the projection from the almost $1 trillion stimulus package— one of President Barack Obama’s deemed legislative successes—stated unemployment would be at 5.4 percent."

West added, "High minimum wages advocated by labor unions from whom Democrats receive tremendous financial support mean employers are less apt to hire unskilled black youths, or any youths for that matter."

"Minimum wage laws tend to prevent hiring of low skilled youths, many of whom are African-American, because low skilled youths often don’t add value to the company great enough to cover the mandated wage," he said.

Republican nominee Mitt Romney maintains an edge on economic issues even in polls in which he trails President Obama.

West remarked, "Food stamp recipients have increased 46 percent since Obama took office and the number of Americans in poverty has increased to 49 million."

]]>http://freebeacon.com/politics/down-and-out-in-obamas-america/feed/0The Student Debt Rackethttp://freebeacon.com/politics/the-student-debt-racket/
http://freebeacon.com/politics/the-student-debt-racket/#respondMon, 29 Oct 2012 09:00:33 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=36161The amount of student debt has increased to record levels during President Obama's administration despite longstanding promises to tackle the problem, according to a report by the College Board Advocacy and Policy Center.

]]>The amount of student debt has increased to record levels during President Obama's administration despite longstanding promises to tackle the problem, according to a report by the College Board Advocacy and Policy Center.

According to the report, "borrowing grew more rapidly from 2005-06 to 2010-11 than it had during the preceding five years." Both borrowers and graduates picked up debt beyond the rate of inflation.

The report found that "debt per borrower grew at an average annual rate of 2.1 percent beyond inflation and average debt per graduate grew at an average annual rate of 2.7 percent." Compare those numbers to 1.4 percent and 2.5 percent, in the time between 2000-01 and 2005-06.

Tuition costs for all types of higher education have hit record highs. The average tuition for a 4-year public university has risen from $6,865 when Obama took office to $8,655 for the 2012-13 school year.

Senator John Thune (R., S.D.), chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, blamed President Obama’s policies for the "bleak economic outlook" that young Americans face.

"Twenty-three million Americans are unemployed or underemployed and nearly five million Americans have been out of work for over a year," he said.

"The fact that 50 percent of recent college graduates remain unemployed or underemployed is unacceptable."

Thune outlined an economic plan to help recent graduates. "By providing tax certainty for our job creators and eliminating excessive government red tape and regulations on our employers, we can get Americans back to work," he said.

Generation Opportunity, a non-partisan, non-profit youth polling organization, found that young people care more about jobs than college debt.

In a July 27 to July 31 poll of 1,003 young adults, the organization discovered that 64 percent of those surveyed "believe the availability of more quality, full-time jobs upon graduation is more important than lower student loan interest rates."

Twenty-six percent of those surveyed said that they delayed "pay[ing] off student loans or other debt" due to the bad state of the economy.

]]>http://freebeacon.com/politics/the-student-debt-racket/feed/0Winning the War for Womenhttp://freebeacon.com/politics/winning-the-war-for-women/
http://freebeacon.com/politics/winning-the-war-for-women/#respondFri, 19 Oct 2012 09:00:20 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=34409A poll released Thursday by Generation Opportunity revealed the depth of young women’s support for free-market policies.

]]>A poll released Thursday by Generation Opportunity revealed the extent of young women’s support for free-market policies.

According to the report, 11.6 percent of women between 18 and 29 do not have a job—a statistic that suggests they may be more worried about economic than social issues. Of the 1,003 adults surveyed online between July 27 and July 31, 2012, 77 percent favor reductions in federal spending and 66 percent believe "if taxes on business were reduced, companies would be more likely to hire."

Sixty-six percent would support "reducing federal spending over raising taxes on individuals to balance the federal budget."

The widespread support for conservative fiscal policy suggests dissatisfaction with the current administration. Only 37 percent of the women polled think "today’s political leaders reflect the interests of young Americans." Of those who responded to the survey, 78 percent plan to vote in the presidential election on Nov. 6.

"Young women are savvy—they’re looking for solutions," said Amber S. Roseboom, executive vice president of Generation Opportunity. "When campaigns aren’t able to talk about the large sweeping issues like jobs, they focus on issues on the periphery in order to drive a wedge" in the electorate.

Ninety percent of respondents said the difficult economy forced them to change their daily lives. Fifty-six percent reduced their food and grocery budget, while 27 percent moved in with family, took on extra roommates, or moved into a cheaper home.

"Those numbers represent real lives," Roseboom said.

More than four in five respondents said they have delayed or might not undertake a major life event such as buying their own home (40 percent), going back to school (35 percent), starting a family (28 percent), or getting married (22 percent).

"Young people are less impressed by endorsements," Roseboom said. "They want to know they’re going to see results."

Hadley Heath, senior policy analyst at the Independent Women’s Forum, agreed with Roseboom. "Women, broadly, are more focused on the economy and jobs," she said.

Heath—a young, unmarried woman—called the Democrat’s "War on Women" not only "preposterous," but also an insult.

"It is insulting to women to put our issues in a box because they relate to the female body or contraception," she said. "All issues are women’s issues."

Heath praised former Massachusetts governor and Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney. "He’s never treated women any less than he’s treated men," she said.

Still, Heath worried Romney might "buy into the idea that gender parity is the goal." Aiming to increase the number of women in Congress or in other leadership positions could be seen as "some kind of affirmative action." It could imply to some that women are the "weaker sex."

"To me, it’s more important that we have the best candidates for a job," Heath said.

According to a recent poll by USA Today / Gallup, Romney is narrowing the gender gap among all women. Obama’s lead is down to a single point among likely female voters.

Kerry Healey, Romney’s lieutenant governor in Massachusetts, said in a statement that he "didn’t judge the people who were in his administration by their gender. He wanted the best, male or female."

Young women see through these attacks, Heath explained. "Really, I think there’s a war on entrepreneurship."

Natalie Knudsen, an art professional in LA and a May 2012 graduate from Hillsdale College, said "the ‘War on Women’ is the real war on women. … The wars women face are the same wars men fight, and the main one of today is the economy," she said.

According to a recent poll by USA Today, Romney is narrowing the gender gap among all women: Obama’s lead is down to a single point among likely female voters in swing states.

Obama’s policies may have restricted young people’s pocketbooks, but they have also taught this generation to use money wisely. "Because of economic stagnation, the millennial generation is going to be a more frugal generation that those before us," Heath said.

]]>http://freebeacon.com/politics/winning-the-war-for-women/feed/0The Great Millennial Meltdownhttp://freebeacon.com/politics/the-great-millennial-meltdown/
http://freebeacon.com/politics/the-great-millennial-meltdown/#respondThu, 02 Aug 2012 13:57:50 +0000http://freebeacon.com/?p=19555Millennials are bearing the brunt of the slow recovery and losing faith in President Obama according to Paul T. Conway, former Chief of Staff at the US Department of Labor and current President of Generation Opportunity.

]]>Millennials are bearing the brunt of the slow recovery and losing faith in President Obama, according to Paul T. Conway, former Chief of Staff at the US Department of Labor and current President of Generation Opportunity.

On Friday, the Labor Department will release its jobs report for July. Their June report put the unemployment of young adults (18-29) at 12.8 percent, but 1.7 million young adults went uncounted because they have stopped looking for work. Taking account for them increases the jobless rate to 16.8 percent.

"This means that this generation is the hardest hit since World War II," Conway told the Free Beacon. The sluggish economy creates "a devastating delay in the careers and the dreams of young Americans."

Last year, Generation Opportunity polled 600 young Americans between 18 and 29, and found that 77 percent "are delaying major life changes due to economic restraints." The poll found 44 percent have delayed buying a home, 28 percent have delayed saving for retirement, 23 percent have delayed starting a family, and 18 percent have delayed marriage.

"An entire demographic is being set back," Conway said, "not just for a few months, but two, three, even five, years. … Businesses are not investing in risky entry-level jobs."

Economic woes are depressing Obama’s support among Millennials. While 66 percent voted for Obama in 2008, last year’s poll found that only 31 percent approve of Obama’s handling of youth unemployment.

"This is a generation focused on solutions," he said, "not beholden to a political party." He described Millenials as "very entrepreneurial," noting, "One of their heroes is Steve Jobs." Sixty-nine percent of those polled supported "reducing federal spending over raising personal taxes to balance the budget."

Conway had harsh words for Labor Secretary Hilda Solis. "The Labor Department has become a vehicle through which the President implements policy by law, by regulation, and by fiat," he said.

"If a business doesn’t have the means to pay but someone who is young and willing to learn skills as an unpaid intern volunteers, the Labor Department says the business can’t hire him," he said.

Conway also mentioned the Labor Department’s response to upcoming sequestration. After last summer’s debt deal, cuts to the Defense Department are set to come into effect next January.

"Secretary Solis indicated that private contractors should not give advice to employees," if they plan mass-layoffs, Conway said. While the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act requires most employers to give 60 days’ notice of labor cut-backs, Solis said that warning employees before the November election would be "inappropriate."

Conway said that many of the workers that would have to be laid off due to the cuts live in key swing states such as Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, and Ohio.

Conway emphasized the importance of millennial voters. "This is the generation that watched 9/11, that fought the war on terror, that witnessed the economic collapse," he said. "They have not lost faith in America—they want an opportunity to go to work."

Political parties and political candidates "have to earn their vote."

"It looks as though, over the past 18 months, one incumbent is losing their vote in large numbers," Conway said. Nevertheless, "the opinion of this demographic is very divided."